Silver Ghost

(album: My Love Affair With Trains - 1976)

On a cold and rainy night I was sitting in the light
Oh my switchman shack of mine post on the mountain
The storms were pretty bad and the telephone was dead
But it was just eleven hours till the dawn.

Then much to my surprice the telegraph jumped in the light
As I read the code I thought could this be true
The train was on its way headed up to mountain grade
But she didn't have no engineer or crew.

At the other switch they tried to put her on the mountain side
But she kept on coming up the mountain grade
But I quickly dowse the light to try to see into the night
Maybe I could spot her headlight in the rain.

She was pounding down below I could hear her whistle blow
And I thought Lord that's a high and mournful sound
Then the telegraph again there's a caving in the mine
And the hundred men have burried neath the ground.

Lord, she's coming now I see her round the bend and straight at me
And her ballet is glowing red as coal in hell
The headlinght switching wide searching all the mountain side
But the only sound she's making it's a wail.

Then I recognized the train by the number and the name
It's from miners Silver Ghost 0-40-1
Then she vanished up the track by the lonely swutchman shack
Like a mother who was looking for her son.

Now I heard the story how an engine went to glory
Over fifty years ago in the same line
It was steaming for the caving there were men needed saving
But it missed the curve in trestle near the mine.

And every now and then you'll hear a whistle on the wind
It's from mountail slides where many men're lost
It's a high and lonely wail and searching up and down the mountain
It's the train they call the Miners Silver Ghost.

The train they call the Miners Silver Ghost.
The train they call the Miners Silver Ghost...